User blog:SodaCat/Style Chapter 5
its not complete but ive been dragging this thing around waaaay too long... it's still unedited, so forgive typos/redundancy/lack of detail ^^; EDIT: finished now C: Bullworth Nights - Style: Chapter 5: Suprise Girlfriend! Previous chapter: Chapter 4: The Key to Friendship is Horror Movies Next chapter: Chapter 6: Fireworks ---- “What time is it?” “Seven, right on the dot.” “Hey, it’s at the Hole, right?” “No shit, Sherlock.” “Psst… you know who’s fighting?” “Russell and that new kid, Hopkins.” Despite her attempts to focus on Mr. Wiggin’s surprisingly dull history lesson, Alexis was unable to tune out the chatter about tonight’s fight from the students sitting all around her. Yeah, the fight was a pretty big focus among the students; apparently the last fight had occurred just after she’d left, between Russell Northrop and some kid who’d since transferred from the school. No surprise there. She turned around in her desk to face Peanut, who was very indiscreetly texting on his phone. “Where are we meetin’ tonight, Lare-bear?” He looked up at her, icing her with an unenthusiastic and disapproving face at the new nickname. “I was thinkin’ we’d meet up by the boys’ dorm, sound good?” Alexis nodded, before biting her lip for a little bit to keep from smiling enough to look too ''suspicious. “Is Johnny comin’?” Peanut studied her for a moment. What was her deal? Lately, everything was Johnny this and Johnny that—would Johnny be okay with that, and maybe we should go with Johnny, and don’t forget to save a seat for Johnny, and Johnny, Johnny, ''Johnny. “No,” he responded slowly, eyes scanning quickly for any sign of Wiggins overhearing him, “he’s gonna meet us there. Listen, Alex, what’s up with you and Johnny lately?” She casted her eyes downward for a moment, her beam breaking through. Well, there wasn’t really any reason to keep it a secret from him, and if things kept going the way they were, she and Johnny would probably be a thing soon anyway. Maybe Peanut could even offer some advice as to how to get it done faster. “Well,” she began, setting her forearms onto his desk, “remember 9th grade, when you, me, and Johnny were walking ‘round the tracks after they shut ‘em down?” He nodded sluggishly at the memory. What was she getting at? Nothing had really ensued that day. They’d just been wandering, the three of them, then they got to the end, and Peanut dipped out to head back to school. Johnny and Alexis had hung back, though, but what was… Oh no. “So, after you’d left,” Alexis said, the glee in her voice making Peanut more and more uneasy, “me and Johnny kind of hung around the terminus for a bit and then… well, we kissed, dude.” Oh hell no. Oh man… what was he gonna tell her? “Uh, Alex,” he started, frantically racking his brain for a gentle way to let her down, “that’s real nice but uh, I don’t know if Johnny’s told you this but—” “Mr. Romano!” Peanut’s head snapped up as he gazed at his clearly infuriated history teacher, who now stood at his desk, scowling directly at Peanut. Alexis whipped around automatically, shoving her face into a book. “Is there something you would like to share with the class?” Hell yeah there was something he wanted to share with the class—that way Alexis would find out once and for all. But he knew that if he told Wiggins that he did want to share with the class, he’d be heading right on down to Crabblesnitch’s, and there was no way in hell he was missing that fight tonight to serve some bullshit detention, even if it meant finally cluing her in. Larry swallowed and shook his head. Wiggins turned back around, muttering under his breath about the problems with today’s youth, but Peanut paid no thought to it. Had it seriously been this long into the school year and Alex still didn’t know about Lola? Johnny hadn’t mentioned Lola to Alexis? That was just way too difficult to believe—did Alexis know and just not care? Who was she kidding? There was no way in hell Johnny was leaving anybody for Lola, not even Alex. He had to tell her. Aw man, but what would that accomplish? She’d moped around for two months when Johnny wasn’t speaking to her, how would she be when she found out that he was permanently off the market for her? Man, he’d only just gotten her to quit her pouting a week ago. No. This was Johnny’s problem. *** Alexis wrapped her arms around herself as she twiddled around in her oversized navy blue Bullworth sweatshirt. The weather was getting moderately cold for early November, so right after gym she’d headed straight to the girls’ dorm and changed into a pair of blue skinny jeans. No way was she going to the Hole in her uniform skirt—she didn’t plan on freezing to death while she watched two idiots beat the shit out of each other. Peanut busted out of the boys’ dorm after a minute, zipping up his leather jacket before thrusting his hands into his pockets. He looked at Alexis for a second before wrapping his arm around her. “You cold?” he inquired, pulling her closer to his side. Maybe he could derail her into liking him rather than Johnny. Shit, how come he always ended up being the middleman? “I ain’t cold,” Alexis protested, though she pressed into Peanut’s side even tighter. She was such a bad liar, he didn’t know why she even bothered trying. “Sure you’re not,” Peanut retorted, rolling his eyes. He started leading her down the familiar way to the Hole, keeping his eye out for any Prefects. There was no way he’d be the one to give up the location of the Hole. He’d seen what’d happened to that chubby nerd kid, Algie, after he threatened to snitch, and it sure wasn’t pretty. Peanut’s hair was too perfect for him to put it through that type of beating. “How come we’re not goin’ inside the school?” Alexis demanded all of a sudden, looking back. “Aren’t we gonna take the elevator?” Peanut shook his head, thinking back to the previous year. “Crabblesnitch almost found the Hole usin’ that elevator so all of us agreed to shut it down. Norton cut the ropes last year.” Alexis nodded, a bit stunned. So much had changed since she’d been at Bullworth. She was pretty lucky that Johnny and Larry were more or less the same. All these changes were making her head spin. *** They arrived just as some kid—Gary Smith, by the looks of it—climbed out of the Hole. Russell stood in the center facing the same short kid from Chemistry class, and the Hole was filling up with students fast. Alexis clutched onto Peanut’s hand securely, doing her best to not get separated from him as she stood on the tips of her Converse, looking around for Johnny. The Hole was sealing up fast, and she didn’t want to wait the duration of the fight to hang out with him. Even though they’d finally started talking again last week on Halloween, she hadn’t really seen much of him lately, and none of the boys ever seemed to know where he was. She was pretty sure they were lying, but as to why, she had no idea. Peanut straightened up too, eyeing around to whatever it was Alexis was squirming around to get a look at. Maybe if he helped her find whatever it was, she’d stand still for a second so that it wouldn’t be so hard to hold on to her. “Oh hey,” he said, as if on auto-pilot, “there’s Norton.” He regret it as soon as he said it. Alexis followed Peanut’s gaze and indeed found herself looking at Norton… and oh, there was Johnny. Walking with some girl she had never seen before? She called his name as everything seemed to turn to slow motion. Johnny didn’t hear her call him, but Norton’s reaction was immediate. He turned to look at Alexis, eyes widening in a mixture of surprise and concern as Johnny leaned over and kissed the slim, auburn-haired, leather-clad beauty beside him right on the plump, blood red lips. Peanut felt as Alexis’ hand went limp, and he stiffened his grip on her smaller hand as hers let go, just barely managing to keep her next to him whilst the crowd thickened as the kids around them strained to get a look at the fight that had long since initiated. “Alex?” His voice echoed in her mind, she just barely heard him. Johnny was still kissing that girl. What the hell? Didn’t they need to breathe or something? They broke apart after a moment, and Johnny turned his head and stared straight at Alexis. The color drained from his face rapidly and he opened his mouth as if to say something to her, but shut it after a moment. “Alex!” Suddenly she was staggering towards the ground, inhaling sharply and trying to navigate through the acute pain in her chest. Was she having a heart attack? No, no, her heart beat was normal, and she could see Peanut pretty clearly, calling her name. “What?” she snapped as he dragged her out of the crowd. “You fell down,” Peanut countered bluntly, sticking his hands under her armpits and standing her up, using the wall to steady her. She brushed his hand away as he touched her cheek, and stared in confusion as he retracted it glistening and smudged with black spots. “You’re cryin’,” he noted, giving her a pitiful look. “I’m not cryin’,” she protested, wiping underneath her eyes with the sleeve of her sweatshirt, minding her eyeliner to keep from smudging it too bad and looking like some sort of street rat. “Why would I be cryin’? Nothin’ worth crying over.” “You saw him kiss Lola, didn’t ya?” Alexis let out a dry giggle, shoving her thumbs into the back pockets of her jeans and glaring off to the side, tears still streaming down her cheeks in spite of her. “So that’s her name? Lola? Pfft, ‘s no biggie. Johnny can kiss whoever he wants, ya dig? I don’t care. He can kiss that chick, or he can kiss Danvers if he wants or, hell, he can kiss my fuckin’ bat if he wants ‘cause that can be arranged at any time,” she mumbled. Peanut sucked in a breath, unsure of what to do. She was taking this even worse than he’d expected. He could hear the fight ending, the chatter was dying down and he couldn’t hear any more punches. He’d be pissed as hell with Alexis, had she not been sobbing right in front of him and pretending she was fine. “Come on,” he murmured, wrapping his arm around her waist and leading her away, “let’s get outta here.” ---- Next chapter: Chapter 6: Fireworks Category:Blog posts